Category Archives: Pop Culture Stench

Dutch Boy® Paint Co. is having a contest to promote their Refresh™ brand paint – a paint that not only brightens the room, but also kills odor (purportedly). People send in pictures of the ugliest, stinkiest room in their houses, and site visitors have the opportunity to view the rooms and vote on which ones look stinkiest. The prizes for the three ugliest, stinkiest rooms are:

As Sporting News notes today, Manny Ramirez has just reached a deal with the Dodgers: $45 million for two years.

Now consider this: in Trenton, New Jersey, a different Manny – Manny Rivera, the firefighter – was fighting for his life a month ago after sustaining a critical injury while saving the life of a teenager:

Lest anyone doubt that Starbucks is serious, employees were reminded that the chain intended to get rid of odoriferous breakfast sandwiches, just so customers can smell the coffee again.

Couldn’t they just get rid of the tea, or the Marcus Samuelsson–inspired baked goods, instead? I’ve got two kids, and sometimes those sandwiches are the only reason I have anything to eat before noon. Oh but wait: The Internet comes to the rescue

Meanwhile, the food critic at the San Diego Union-Tribune asks:

…I’ve endured parched maple scones in L.A., sickly-sweet streusel coffeecake in Chicago and a muffin in the Boston airport that didn’t make it past the first trash can.

What’s with Starbucks’ pastries? How can they be uniformly dry and tasteless in markets across the country? How can a company that prides itself on consistency and quality control of its coffee products be so hopelessly out of the loop with its edibles…?

And since, out of these five posts, “Musky Matthew McConaughey” is the most recent, by far (Feb. 1), it appears that the earthy miasma of this Tinseltown hunkster’s armpits (according to Fool’s Gold co-star Kate Hudson) deeply interests some people.

Oh – and I should note that some of the incoming links on the Matthew McConaughey post are from gay sites, replete with generally artless photos of large tumescent appendages. Henceforth, I think I will call this the “Flamin’ response” which is a play on the scientific term, “Flehmen Response,” a phenomenon which has everything to do with the sense of smell.

The former Destiny’s Child star hates eating plane food so she decided to grab a “smelly” Subway takeaway roll laden with onions before boarding.

She said: “I took a Subway sandwich onto a plane and I was in first class. The other passengers were not happy with the smell! I looked around and could see a lot of disgusted faces. I put everything on it, and the onions made it really smelly!”

Although none of her fellow passengers scolded the singer, Kelly already had her excuse readied in case someone did shout at her.

She added: “If I think I’m going to get into trouble I always say that I’m sick. Then they feel like they can’t really be cross with you. They think you are too feeble for them to be angry with you.”

….Documents filed last month with the United States Patent and Trademark Office say the singer wants exclusive rights to her own name when it comes to products including fragrances, aftershave, bath soap, body lotion and talc

The move has got blogs and fan sites wondering about a possible product line….

Smelly Davos unveils new world odor

DAVOS, Switzerland (CNN) — If there’s a sweet smell at this year’s Global Economic Forum, it’s unlikely to be success.

With troubled markets threatening to leave an unpleasant stink over proceedings, this year’s Davos summit has enlisted the help of a perfumer to ensure gathered world leaders and business chiefs don’t turn up their noses.

Christophe Laudamiel, a scientist who stirs up scent cocktails for New York-based International Flavors and Fragrances has spent the past six months developing a range of odors he hopes will help delegates tackle the financial meltdown.

“Even though Davos has a very corporate image, it is looking to the future and the world of olfaction, of smell and perfumery is part of the future,” Laudamiel told CNN in the lightly-scented entrance lobby of the Forum’s main venue.

Laudamiel, and his collaborator, Berlin-based Christophe Hornetz, have installed eight fragrance dispensers throughout the conference center, squirting tiny whiffs of his specially blended aromas into the thin mountain air being inhaled by Microsoft founder Bill Gates, U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon and many others.

Having watched a few episodes of Adult Swim’s Metalocalypse, I find the following quite amusing, in a lowbrow sort of way.

Oh – and I think it stinks, too. Putrid. Almost entirely without redeeming artistic or social merit. But, then, I’m a product of my generation, having been born at the tail-end of the baby boomers. I can’t quite get my head around the concept of “the worse it is, the better.” I’m just not “progressive” enough, I guess.

Mind you, grim things can be artistic. And there’s no questioning that the following is art. It’s just not good art. It has no nuance, no subtlety. It’s garish, gratuitous, and sophomoric. And that’s what makes it “good.” That’s the standard to which it aspires.

And to think that my parents thought that Alice Cooper was the Devil.

SPLATTERED MERMAIDS, the Swedish death/grind band featuring members of DERANGED and VISCERAL BLEEDING, has issued the following update:

“The new SPLATTERED MERMAIDS album, ‘Stench of Flesh’, is complete! Listen to one new song and view cover artwork exclusively on MySpace.

“The album was recorded in early January 2008 and has 10 songs (including one instrumental track and a re-recorded version of ‘By My Blade’). To be released via Czech label Bizarre Leprous Productions [on] March 15, 2008.”

According to a press release, the CD “[is] brutal as hell” featuring “straight-forward deathgrind combined with groovy breakdowns and guttural vocals… the band’s most brutal album to date!!” Other songtitles set to appear on the CD include “Gruesome”, “Circular Holes in the Cranial Structure”, “Corporal Manifestation”, “Spliced Spleen Spices”, “Throat Unsafe from a Pair of Scissors” and “Stench of Flesh”. (source)

Adding to my amusement is the hosting website’s administrative statement, immediately following the above: “to report any abusive, obscene, defamatory, racist, homophobic or threatening comments, or anything that may violate any applicable laws, please send an e-mail to…”